Why am I a Christian? I started to follow Jesus to be saved. Saved from what? Saved from death, destruction and suffering.

When I was fifteen, I had some very depressing thoughts about life and death. My worldview, which I shared with many of my friends, was that there was nothing after death, and that I along with all of humanity are inevitably heading for nonexistance, where it won’t be dark because we will not have eyes to see with and it will not be quiet since we will have no ears to hear with. We won’t even remember that we’ve ever lived, and in the end no one else will remember it either. Everything is pointless. It takes less than that to give you anxiety.

My Lutheran father brought me to church on April 2 2006, and I wasn’t too excited since I had been there before and literally thought that it was the most boring place on earth. But for the first time, I actually started to listen to what they were saying. The Apostles’ Creed said “I believe in the resurrection of the body, and life everlasting”. Now, these were good news! I started to read the Gospels, learned that “gospel” really means good news and that it’s central message is that when we follow Jesus into the Kingdom of God, we get eternal life:

The life appeared; we have seen it and testify to it, and we proclaim to you the eternal life, which was with the Father and has appeared to us. (1 John 1:2)

Very truly I tell you, whoever obeys my word will never see death. (Jesus in John 8:51)

To those who by persistence in doing good seek glory, honor and immortality, God will give eternal life. (Romans 2:7)

For the perishable must clothe itself with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality. When the perishable has been clothed with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality, then the saying that is written will come true: “Death has been swallowed up in victory.” (1 Cor 15:53-54)

I was thrilled, realizing this! Death will not be victorious, Jesus will be! If I believe in Him, I will be immortal. I drank deeply from the comforting words in the Bible that spoke about the eternal glorious life that Jesus promised His followers.

But after a while, I started to doubt. How do I know this is true? One evening, I prayed passionately that God would show Himself to me, that I would see Him and not just read about Him so that I may know that His promises are true.

And then I did see Jesus. He appeared to me, countless times. I saw His face, I felt His presence, and I even heard His voice. When I asked Him if He wanted me to be an activist for peace and justice, a booming voice inside of me said “You know that yourself”.

Now, I could go on and on giving you examples and arguments of why I find the Jesus revolution being reasonable, miraculous and radical, and that is precisely why I have this blog and my YouTube channel. But I’m also hoping that many of you that already have started to realize this has came to this post, based on the title, simply to know the next step. If you like to receive salvation and eternal life, what must you do? Paul, who himself was transformed from a persecuting extremist to a pacifist Jesus fan, wrote:

If you declare with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. (Romans 10:9)

That’s it? Yes it is. You don’t deserve yourself to Heaven, simply because it is impossible: “All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and all are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. God presented Christ as a sacrifice of atonement, through the shedding of his blood—to be received by faith.” (Rom 3:23-25). We all die because of our sinful deeds, that is, evil and unloving things we do that aren’t caused by love for God or love for our fellow human beings. God, who is Life with a big L, is incompatible with sin, and so when we depart from Him we perish.

But God sent His Son Jesus Christ to die for our sake. Being divine and sinless, He didn’t deserve to die, but He did die in a horrible way to set us free from the slavery of sin, evil and death.

Christ, being in very nature God,

did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage;

rather, he made himself nothing

by taking the very nature of a servant,

being made in human likeness.

And being found in appearance as a man,

he humbled himself

by becoming obedient to death—

even death on a cross! (Phil 2:6-8)

After He had died He rose from the dead, showing that He is the Way to eternal life. And He is still alive today, doing miracles and showing Himself to people, including me. Again, what you need to do to receive endless joy with Him is to declare Him as your Boss (i.e. Lord) and believe that death isn’t the end but that He rose from the dead. Then, you tell some other Jesus followers in your area and ask them to baptise you in water, as a sign of your new life and the cleansing of your sins. Please write something to me as well if you take this decision.